When Mr. Gladstone’s Government took office they began by trying to discover a Prince who could take Afghanistan off their hands, and for that purpose they tried to treat with Abdurrahman Khan. Unfortunately, Candahar was not only held by a weak force under General Primrose, but it had been decided by the Indian authorities to still further weaken it by sending General Burrows with a moiety of its garrison--some 2,000 men--to meet Ayoob Khan, and co-operate with the troops of the Wali of Candahar in checking the advance of the Heratees. The troops of the Wali, however, deserted to Ayoob Khan, and on the 27th of July Burrows and his small force were overwhelmed by the Heratees at Maiwand. The line of their retreat was covered with the bodies of those who perished by the way, and comparatively few survivors arrived to tell the tale of their terrible disaster. Of course Candahar was now at the mercy of Ayoob Khan, and it was known that the fall of that stronghold would shake the foundations of the British Empire in India. At this critical moment Sir Frederick Roberts saved the situation. He set forth from Cabul with a picked force of 10,000 men, and by a marvellous series of forced marches he arrived in time to defeat Ayoob Khan and rescue Candahar. Ere this crowning victory was won, it had been settled that Abdurrahman was to be the new Ameer of Afghanistan, and as the year closed the British Army of occupation had quitted Sherpore on its homeward march to India.
The mischievous policy of annexation which had been pursued in South Africa was now bearing fruit. When the Transvaal Republic was annexed Englishmen were told that the Boers desired annexation. As a matter of fact, the Boers never meant to submit to the loss of their independence. When the Boers in the Transvaal asked for the restoration of their rights, they were told by Sir Bartle Frere that England would never concede their claims; though, as a matter of fact, no sane Englishman had ever dreamt of holding the Transvaal Republic by an army of occupation against the will of its people. The effect of these misrepresentations was somewhat neutralised by Boer deputations who visited England, by Radicals like Mr. Courtney, and Home Rulers like Mr. Parnell and Mr. F. H. O’Donnell, who warned Englishmen that the Boers were discontented, and that they would rise in insurrection. Mr. Gladstone, too, in his election speeches kept alive Boer aspirations for independence, by condemning their enforced subjection to a British Colonial bureaucracy. The Boers ultimately rebelled, the occasion of the revolt being the refusal of a citizen at Pretoria to pay an illegal claim made on him by the Treasury. On the 13th of December, 1880, at Heidelberg, they proclaimed a Republic under the Triumvirate of Kruger, Joubert, and Pretorius. A collision between the insurgents and British troops under Colonel Anstruther occurred at Bronkhorst Spruit, which ended in the defeat of the latter; and as the year closed, General Sir George Pomeroy Colley was making a futile effort to quell the rising and reconquer the Transvaal.